It's been so long, it seems like it was yesterday.

What if?

Life has moved along so much, I feel like I'm coming round the final bend and looking at the starting point of it all again. We try to keep going forward but sometimes it comes back. What might have been?

What if not?

Life has gone up and down and up, I wonder if somethings didn't happen, perhaps I would have just inverted the wave function and the things that have gone up will now be going down and vice versa. Would I have it any other way?

What if, then?

Life has spun around so many times, I am confused which way things originally were, perhaps events turned life up-side-down and time turned it right-side-up. Or maybe vice-versa. What has become of all this?

funky little thing, this thing. life. funky, funny and sometimes freakish.

Since my sister hasn't been posting to our tumblr...

...I get to spend my spare time posting here, oh how I've missed you you no-nonsense, rant-promoting, angsty textbox that is blogger.com!

The quarter is coming to an end and I've learnt many things this term in Uchicago:

1) When you are the 1% nerd in a 99% cool world, you are obliged to promote your inner nerd and be shunned by society. Its ok. For therapy we can always go to Uchicago.

2) One day far away, is far away for far too long (/cueoldnicklebacksongs) but one day where you belong is strength enough to keep standing strong, and keep holding on (/cueoldkellyclarksonsongs)

3) Cranberry/Orange juice. Best combination ever.

4) Nerd relationships=topological spaces. Also, we should have a bar named $\overline{X}$ (if you understand LaTeX. Oh the wonders that IBL has taught me.

5) The future is a bitchybitchy thing. Grad school, work, settling down, whether I should go get another plate of food...are all so difficult to plan for. And once you make set goals to work towards any one of these, it only seems exponentially more difficult. I tell myself all that matters is the moment, and doing the best you can with it...but I'm still not too sure if that's all that matters.

Dreams last for so long, even after you're gone.

How does a hot-air balloon fly?

When the air within the balloon is heated up to a higher pressure. When the air escapes the balloon, it lifts off the ground because the density of air in the balloon is lower than that of the surrounding air.

Maybe hot-air balloons have a lesson for us all. When we're under heat and pressure, we just want to fly up and get free. However, when we get into the air, we realise we've lost some of who we are and become hollower inside.

Dreams are lofty things, borne out of a heavy life. So be glad for the light life you have and don't burden it with dreams that are too high up.

You make me smile, maybe just for a while

Yes I am screwing up Colbie Caillat's lyrics. So sue me.

Emoticons carry much implicit meaning, I'm realising more and more as I think about the smile. Alright, let's not consider my IJ guides who epitomise the emoticon-overuser and send me an SMS with 15 smilies in it. Let us consider the normal applications of the smile, amid other much more mundane text, much like something "smilable-at" only has gravity within a day that is otherwise mundane or downright suboptimal.

Many things make you :D but few things make you :)

Because one can always laugh without being happy

Many things make you ^^ but few things make you :)

Because its easier to be happy with your eyes squeezed close

Many things make you :3 but few things make you :)

Because the things which you find adorable rarely bring you joy

And even when many things that made you :), few things make you :')

Because things can make you happy, but few can touch your heart.

Thank you if you have made me smile today,

its probably much more than I have ever done for you.

blog to work, work to blog.

Maybe its musing about the Katy Perry nail polish collection that has me thinking about this song:

If stars don't align, if you don't see the signs,

Wait for it.

One hundred percent, with every penny spent,

He'll be the one who finishes your sentences.

It's not like the movies, that's how it should be,

When's he's the one, he'll come undone,

And the world will stop spinning,

And it's just the beginning.

The problem with movies and stories and all that is that they have the power of saying "3 months later" or "ten years later". We invariably don't. Also, there is something so unspeakably powerful to being able to say "The story ends here and these are the lessons learnt." The reality is that in life, there is no "fast-forward" and there is no "pause" buttons. You cannot linger a little longer in the good stuff to remember how to feel, nor in the bad stuff to learn your lesson. Life trudges on and because the story never ends, the lessons never end too.

Oh well, time to go post happy stuff on my other blog.

~

After seeing many-a-facebook-post on this, I finally decided to google that annoying song that keeps floating about my sister’s facebook page. Rawr, and I still try to tell myself I don’t miss her.

In any case, the mesh of being in Chicago and listening to that song leads you to strange arguments with yourself. I’ll admit that it is a beautiful song but…

1) If you get pulled into someone else’s gravity, the relationship will lose potential…right?

2) But then again, it is logical that you don’t want to fall further in because gravity will increase proportionally to the square of the distance from the object’s centre.

3) However, you don’t really “fall” into gravity right, fall implies a force that doesn’t change, meaning a constant acceleration. If we really consider this person having the gravity that the song purports, we need to consider the change in force with distance to the person.

4) In addition, you should technically be pulled together with the same force, hence its more of “falling together” not really “falling towards”…unless….

5) IT’S SAYING THAT I’M FAT D: /oversensitive emoness

I'm alright.

Just a kiss on your lips in the moonlight,

Just a touch and the fire's burning so bright

I don't want to mess this thing up,

I don't want to push too far.

Just a shot in the dark that you just might,

Be the one I've been waiting for my whole life

So baby I'm alright, with just a kiss goodnight.

Ahhh this song seems to be sweeping over everyone like an annoyingly long and cold Chicago rain: It's cleansing but somewhat chilling. Almost as if it washes over you and reminds you of the empty spaces within yourself. Yes, I'm being strangely poetic tonight, but as some may say, it's vaguely warranted today, especially, since it's, you know, it's today!

Mmmph.

School has been delightfully slow-paced in getting started, but I get the nagging feeling it is the calm before a massive storm...hm. Like the last training-level in a game before the zombies start jumping out and outnumbering you 100 to 1. Let us take stock:

Survive O-week - Achievement Unlocked!

Go to a frat-party - Achievement Unlocked! (But never to be repeated)

Walk downtown Chicago 4 times in 1 day - Achievement Unlocked!

Buy 11 pairs of new socks - Achievement Unlocked!

Visit a Chicago home - Achievement Unlocked!

Reheat pizza in my oven - Achievement Unlocked! (Extra points for not burning down the building in the process :D )

Decide that Uchicago is definitely where I belong - Achievement Unlocked!

Calculating if more of uchicago walls are visibly stone or ivy - In progress.

Freshmen 15 - Definitely in progress.

Managing finances and getting all the bank stuff in order - In progress (I'm not an Econ major, give me a break.)

Preparing for a school year - In progress (hey, I read "V for Vendetta" to remind myself how to read!)

Surviving classes - Just starting

Getting a social life - Can I do this tomorrow?

Not joining another bridge club - Failed.

Tacos for the uninitiated!

Hello my blogspot readers (or lack there of). This post, in addition to being my 134th piece of trash to lend on the internet via blogspot, is also the DAWN OF A NEW ERA (of trash). This post has also been posted on etremanque.tumblr.com, a completely NEW BLOG to take over some of my trashiness. Its a joint blog between my sister and I for when I'm overseas and we lack each other's randomness to keep us alive hurhurhur. So, my non-existent readers, I suggest you start reading that one too. I'll continue to fill this blog with my personal trash but that one will be getting a fair share of it too (I mean, with my sister's help, of course ^^).

Anyway I’ve been in Chicago for quite a few days now and its pure awesome. Yesterday, the international students went down to Michigan Avenue, Navy Pier and all that cool jazz. But, as I always say, outings are more about the people than about the place so yesterday’s highlight must be eating Tacos at Chipotle.

Let me begin by introducing the people at the table. There was Jason (aka Zhansheng), Tyler (aka Tianyu), Emma (aka Kejia) and Ruth (aka The Awesome). Apart from me trying very hard to calling them by their oh-so-cool english names, much hilarity ensued in the taco-eating department.

Calamity 1: Without much experience in the taco-eating business, we all took advice from Jason about what to order. Emma was very enthused by the idea of getting a bowl. A “bowl”, so it turns out, refers to a bowl of rice and not its ceramic container. Meanwhile, it was possible to order rice as a topping on the bowl of rice. I figure Emma was as confused as I was and eventually settled for a Taco. Which Jason assured us was the “easiest to eat”. This brings us to…

Calamity 2: THEY AREN’T EASY TO EAT. I had one with cheese, sourcream and guacamole which SHOULD hold together

…but my hands were covered in goo afterwards anyway. Emma said that she’d rather have sat next to me so that she would not need to watch the “unglam”-ness from opposite the table.

Calamity 3: Tyler. Tyler is an ultimate fail. He ordered a VEGGIE taco which is made up of cooked bell peppers and spices from what I could tell. So that stuff hardly had the promise of sticking together. In addition, he put rice and beans in it so you can guess how it held together. Long story short, as the corn-y (TEEHEE) material fell apart, it went from being a hard shell taco to a soft shell taco to a burrito to an off-shape salad with sad limpy excuses for cornbread. But hey, he paid for 1 meal and managed to try all the options at chipotle right?

Just before going to the airport...

After a day of talking and wishing and thinking and wondering...I guess there is nothing left but to pray. I'm very rarely so sappy on this blog but

Let this be our prayer, when shadows fill our days...

Lead us to a place, guide us with Your grace,

To a place where we'll be safe.

I will never forget how far my family has come and what a lovely family I come from. And, of course, all the people I have had the pleasure of meeting in my 19 years.

With God, Family and Friends, what can go wrong, right?